Mirror Play has been performed numerous times in the United States, Canada, and in Europe. European productions have been bilingual readings combining English with German, French, and Czech depending on the occasion. It has also been performed as a music text and as a multi-media, cross-genre performance piece. In 2005, the work, directed by Jim Cave,  was performed at the Susanne Hilberry Gallery in Ferndale, Michigan, a few blocks north of 8 Mile Road in Detroit. Actors, musicians, and sound/visual designers from Detroit (Elana Elyce, Walonda Lewis, and Mary Byrnes, actors; John Olson, musician; Mike Peter, sound engineer; Danielle Aubert, designer; Joel Levise and Asa Watten, tech support) and the San Francisco Bay Area (Jim Cave and Roham Shaikhani, actors; Jon Raskin, musician) all contributed. The performance took place in two sets; the following images are from the first, more constructed set, while the second continued to elaborate on its language, gestures, scenes, images, and sounds in a more improvisatory manner. Gallery works by Mona Shahid, Matthew Blake, Mitch Cope, and Shannon Goff (portraits and sculpture by the first two visible in the stills) also became a part of the interpretation of the text and were important elements in the production.

 

  Preview Clips

 

Mirror Play performed in Paris, Double Change, Beton Salon) with Juliette de Laroque:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNec8ypAROk

 

 

Audio: Mirror Play (German) Holderlintum, Tubingen

 

Mirror Play (German) ▶ custom player

 

Critical Response

Heidi  Bean, “Carla Harryman’s Non/Representation and the Ethics of Dispersive Performance.” Postmodern Culture, Johns Hopkins University Press. Volume 20, Number 1, September 2009.